With the adjustments being made with the NPC AI I am wondering if the Hive and other agressive type NPC's are having any adjustments under the hood.

If so, or if not, I do think we should start increasing Hive activity. Things like have Hive bots start attacking stations in grey. Small forces approaching nation wormholes and getting blown up by turrets. Making the Hive more of a presence basically, and adding interest in doing more attacks on them. If the hives build up in grey have them try to expand. <shrugs> Adds another element to the playing field.

I'd be interested to hear why you think the hyper-intelligent hive would send waves of bots to be smashed by border defense turrets.

hyper intelligent? we have proof of this?

And more so just saying that we have trouble breaching the turrets, they probably would have more trouble as they don't have hogs >.> or something similar that I know of. Though they could just destroy all the turrets and waltz in. ;p I dunno we would have to see what would happen.

The point being is to have them try and attack. Whether they succeed or not, that is just fun to speculate.

The Hive essentially operates as a single massively parallel computer with more processing capability than the entire human race could even dream of, and the ability to manufacture more practically without bounds. It has an artificial intelligence capable of designing self-replicating machines, energy shields, positron blasters, and many other technological marvels that humans can barely even reverse-engineer satisfactorily.
Does that constitute hyper-intelligence? I don't care to get into an argument of semantics, but probably. Are they smart enough not to waste perfectly good ships by repeatedly bashing themselves against border defense turrets, when they already have a presence on the other side of said turrets anyway? Absolutely. Anyway, If they felt a need to build interceptor-type ships, it wouldn't be an issue. They don't have something like the hog because they have no use for something like the hog.

Actually, I think the hive could easily take out the border defense. I know of at least one PCC mission in "live" VO where the hive can take out a trident and not all that many of them. I have done some testing with hive against cap ships and it's surprising what they can do if there is concerted effort.

I'm not questioning the hive's ability to take out border defense turrets. They could do that without even losing a ship if they really wanted to. Dameos didn't suggest that the hive take out turrets, though, he suggested that they go sit in the sector and get killed by them.

I agree that I mentioned small forces approaching nation wormholes, and I think they could easily take out the turrets also. The problem isn't whether they can or not, it is that they don't. Wouldn't it be interesting if the Hive was more active, and more aggresive?

why not turn this into an rp event where for a few months the hive becomes hyper active and need a concentraited effort by serco uit and itani to fight back something akin to the spike rp event.

NSI was quite some time ago ...

By your definition, ladron, ants are (probably) hyper-intelligent.

It does not hold water because so far, the Hive has not displayed more than a standard survival pattern. In other words, I doubt its self-awareness.

What always struck me as interesting, however, was the parallels between VO's Hive and Marathon's Rampancy.

Yea, I was thinking this could be a cool game event for a few months. Plan out a story arc that can gradually be posted online. Players drive the story as it unfolds and everybody has to work together to defend from the Hive. I'm sure it would take a lot of work, but this is the kind of stuff that could happen when there are game masters and Guild has enough people and resources to start doing real in game events.

"Vendetta Hive Wars" has a cool ring to it. Or "Vendetta Battle Star Galactica" but there might be some trademark issues...

I'm guessing that's a little beyond what Guild has the resources to do at the moment though.

toshiro: Engineering entirely new machines to solve entirely new problems is not "standard survival behavior". The Hive engineered shield generators, Queens, Leviathans, Positron blasters, and more, all in response to new problems. Ants have faced the same problems over and over again for the last 100 million years, and have utilized exactly the same solutions over and over again. Your argument does not hold water because every single fact (a total of one, for the record) you cite is categorically incorrectly.

Also, we used to have guides. They left eventually. Why have new ones not been found to replace them?

Or "Vendetta Battle Star Galactica" but there might be some trademark issues...

Yeah, too bad we can't rename the escort missions "Vendetta Star Trek". That would be just as awesome.

ladron;

I continue to disagree. Ants have created supercolonies that span staggering distances, with multiple queens. While I do not know if that is a solution to a discrete problem, it is certainly a new aspect to the species.

As or the Hive, the aspects you list do not exceed evolutionary processes, accelerated by the computing power (and probably heuristic procedures) that is probably attributable to the Hive, or at least its Queens and the Leviathan. Engineering entirely new machines/devices is what evolution is supposed to do, really. It's what we do, too, albeit at a much slower rate. And I'm not sure you allow enough time for the ants to evolve here, because usually, evolution does take some time to alter things, it doesn't just mutate organisms radically and with purpose, which I fear is what you suppose (unless you support the theory of Intelligent Design, which I would find lamentable).

No... reading up on ants and their evolutionary process (curse you for making me do that), it appears to me that my comparison, flawed though as they are by definition, is not as incorrect as you would like it to be. In other words, you seem to be simply wrong about ants.

You have to realize that I do not aim to discredit the Hive in any way, I simply doubt its hyper-intelligence or self-awareness. My reasoning for that is that while the Hive is very territorial and also spreads (possibly according to ore availability/roid temperature, and if not, it would be interesting to have that), it does not target specific structures, or actively ambush convoys - yet. It would certainly be interesting to have added content in the form of a Hive storyline, but that has been asked for for quite some time.

For these reasons, your argument holds about as much water as a sieve.

I continue to disagree. Ants have created supercolonies that span staggering distances, with multiple queens. While I do not know if that is a solution to a discrete problem, it is certainly a new aspect to the species.

Sort of like fetching a stick thrown by a human is certainly a new aspect to the dog?

As or the Hive, the aspects you list do not exceed evolutionary processes, accelerated by the computing power (and probably heuristic procedures) that is probably attributable to the Hive, or at least its Queens and the Leviathan. Engineering entirely new machines/devices is what evolution is supposed to do, really. It's what we do, too, albeit at a much slower rate. And I'm not sure you allow enough time for the ants to evolve here, because usually, evolution does take some time to alter things, it doesn't just mutate organisms radically and with purpose, which I fear is what you suppose (unless you support the theory of Intelligent Design, which I would find lamentable).

So because ants have evolved colony behaviors over 100's of millions of years, the fact that the Hive has designed new works of technology radically different from and superior to existing technology over the last 100 years or less is irrelevant? You're comparing apples to Dyson spheres here. Also, note my use of the words "evolved" and "designed". These are two entirely different concepts. The Hive did not try millions of variants of shield generators over millions of years before finally finding one that worked; they determined that one was necessary to protect their queens and leviathans, so they designed one and built it. Saying the Hive 'evolved' these technologies is like saying that Humans 'evolved' computers - a claim that could only be made by someone who lacks even the most basic understanding of evolution.
Wait, hang on - "And I'm not sure you allow enough time for the ants to evolve here, because usually, evolution does take some time to alter things, it doesn't just mutate organisms radically and with purpose" - you already knew that. Are you literally just trolling at this point?

No... reading up on ants and their evolutionary process (curse you for making me do that), it appears to me that my comparison, flawed though as they are by definition, is not as incorrect as you would like it to be. In other words, you seem to be simply wrong about ants.

While I'm glad that you can read, your critical thinking and language comprehension skills definitely need some work before you get into these kinds of debates. I wouldn't want you to sprain something. (Protip: "Slightly less than 100% correct" != "Simply wrong")

You have to realize that I do not aim to discredit the Hive in any way, I simply doubt its hyper-intelligence or self-awareness. My reasoning for that is that while the Hive is very territorial and also spreads (possibly according to ore availability/roid temperature, and if not, it would be interesting to have that), it does not target specific structures, or actively ambush convoys - yet. It would certainly be interesting to have added content in the form of a Hive storyline, but that has been asked for for quite some time.

While I appreciate the fact that your understanding of the Hive, intelligence, and territorial behavior is not on the level it needs to be to hold your own in a conversation about those things, I'm not going to give you pity points. Quit groveling.

For these reasons, your argument holds about as much water as a sieve.
...lol

So basically, you cannot counter my arguments with anything really worth-wile (save harping on the same strings you plucked before), but you presume you're right anyway? I can return the accusation of trolling to the sender.

It's cute how you try to be like Lecter, by the way.

P.S.

You seem to have a misconception of evolution and its place in computer sciences. You are not slightly less than 100% correct, you are showing lack of basic understanding, not only of the fact that there is no proof for your claims (since the Hive was created by GSW, and not in reality, obviously), but of fields of research crucial to support your claims.

For starters, suspending disbelief about it all being a game, it is not exactly the case that the technology seen in the Hive is either radically different from or superior to that available to players and non-Hive NPCs. If you thought about it for more than 2 minutes before writing your post, you'd see this is self-evident, because players have little trouble in taking down even the strongest of the Hive ships.

Secondly, as you so rightly point out, evolving to be a dominant species (as the ants are), and designing something to that end are very different, if looked at only superficially. If you try to gain an understanding of how the Hive would come to a decision that one design is superior to the other, however, it becomes obvious that there would be several methods to achieve a result, one of which (and, possibly, the strongest) being evolutionary algorithms.

You seem to forget that it was not the Hive that designed itself but humans that designed the Hive, which then went rogue. To date, it has shown precious little change. And it has not even replaced its "new works of technology radically different from and superior to existing technology" with even more superior technology, despite the losses the Hive sustains.

So before you try to use insults that are defeated as you write them, you should maybe do some reading, and researching, yourself, hmm? Instead of, for instance, adopting a patronizing attitude that serves only to hide your own insecurity.